Newest Mars rover finishes software swap and begins checkout phase.

Tomorrow is a big day for Curiosity, because JPL's engineering team can start checking out the Mars Science Laboratory's instruments, having finished loading Curiosity's surface-optimized software over the last 4 sols.

Over the past few sols, JPL painstakingly reprogrammed both of its CPUs' radiation-hardened, electrically erasable programmable read-only memory, or EEPROMs, with new operating systems, testing each one carefully to make sure nothing went awry. The software was uploaded to Curiosity en route to Mars, so it's been waiting for the initial post-landing instrument checkouts to be completed.

We're well into Curiosity's Characterization Activity Phase (CAP), the month-long process of testing each part of the rover. Now comes the instrument checkout with the new software. Curiosity's instruments will each be turned on to make sure that data comes back looking the way it should. The Alpha-particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS) and Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons (DAN) instrument will both be powered up—APXS for a second, 20-minute test, DAN for the first time. DAN has an active and passive mode. In active mode DAN is capable of firing neutrons, but for now DAN will only be tried in passive mode. The Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) X-ray diffraction and X-ray fluorescence instrument will get a checkout as well. Curiosity's radiation assessment detector (RAD) was already powered up shortly after landing.

A few images from Curiosity's memory have been downloaded over the last few days, despite the fact that no new science has been done yet. JPL would like to empty Curiosity's camera memory and make room for more pictures. The image below, looking southeast toward Mt. Sharp, shows mesas and buttes in the foothills, with artificially colored patches of sand in the foreground lying atop basalt rock. The mountain itself, the central peak of Gale Crater, is unfortunately cut off. These pictures were programmed before Curiosity actually arrived; new ones will be taken in a few sols to show the peak.

Image taken from a mosaic of images from Curiosity's Mast Camera, looking south toward the base of Mt. Sharp

In addition to what's come out of Curiosity's post-landing checkout, there was a strip of images downloaded from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's HiRISE camera. These images have been better-centered on Curiosity's location now that we know more accurately where Curiosity is. This image is just the top of a long strip that wouldn't fit in this article; clicking on it will take you to the entire image, well worth seeing.

JPL's Ashwin Vasavada pointed out a series of new overall firsts for the Mars Science Laboratory mission: the first-ever panorama of Gale Crater, the first measurements of high energy radiation on another planet, the first movie of a spacecraft landing on another planet, the first images from a focusable camera on another planet, first images of an ancient Martian river channel. Those Martian river channels were first spotted by Mariner in 1971; we've waited 41 years to see them close-up.

During the Tuesday press conference, JPL's MSL avionics chief engineer Jim Donaldson quoted Alfred North Whitehead, who once wrote, "Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them." He was talking about the evolution of thought that was necessitated within JPL by the design of the rover's electronics. Curiosity has roughly 1.2 million logic gates arrayed over several Field Programmable Gate Arrays. JPL engineers who had worked on the roughly 20,000 gates apiece for Cassini and the Mars Exploration Rovers were initially bulldozed by the size of the job for Curiosity, which required new management practices, new tools, new thinking and ultimately more engineers. Eventually, although the probe was delayed, JPL was able to rise to the challenge.

One new capability Curiosity has, a "dream mode," allows the rover to do several things while it's sleeping. In its sleep, Curiosity can turn heaters on and off, monitor vehicle health and in general prepare for the next sol's activity. The new mode allows things to take place in a way that keeps most systems quiescent and saves power for the next sol.

On Sol 13, a few sols from now, JPL will relay commands to turn each one of the rover's wheels in place. When that's done, two sols later, Curiosity will take its first drive, advancing a few meters, turning to reverse so that it avoids backing into unseen territory, and then moving back to its original spot.

Shortly after that, Curiosity will have about a two-week window to do science before the engineering team reclaims the rover for a few more days to finish instrument checkout and test the arm. The rover will begin moving toward Mt. Sharp and ascend through the clay and sulphate layers at its base. The science team will be forced to choose one of six paths that have been identified through the buttes.

Or maybe not.

A few hundred meters in the wrong direction, Curiosity seems to have landed next to some alluvial fans that suggest water flow. This kind of dilemma was completely expected by the MSL science team; they knew they'd see things once Curiosity landed that would force them to consider, and reconsider, roads not taken.

I like NASA's softly softly approach. With a fortnight of science before moving, even if the rover explodes or something when they try to drive it, they'll have got some payback. You can see the same thing in the way they've returned thumbnails first etc; *any* science is better than none if it all goes wrong.

"Using an FPGA gives a certain amount of redundancy from failure (especially from radiation damage that could cause some random failure of the logic) as the system routing can be re-configured to avoid the damaged areas."

Not sure if that's the only purpose or if they want to ability to reconfigure the hardware in someway remotely for high performance hardware functions. Flexibility is good either way.

I understand why NASA is moving slowly. It makes sense to be cautious, they have a limited data channel anyway, and they have plenty of time. But I still would like it to be faster. This is a big reason why human exploration is more fun---the time limit forces people to move faster, and people are better at self-diagnostics than robots (at least they think they are). A human on Mars would never stay in one spot for two weeks.

Sending a human to Mars might cost a hundred times as much as sending a rover, and would probably be less useful scientifically. Yet there is still a lot of support for the idea, because it's cool. NASA might consider sacrificing some science in its rover program in order to up the coolness factor.

Nice summary of the telecon - even included that interminable avionics information!

A minor correction for you: the two primary "computing elements" have 2GB storage each, but the cameras have their own storage, too. MastCam's cameras, for example, has "eight GB of flash memory [each], which is capable of storing over 5,500 raw images". MAHLI does too.

Wow, everything looks so similar to Earth. It's amazing to think that so many millions of miles away, you have the same elements, molecules, physics that make everything look so similar.

For what it's worth, I do hope they find life!

I'm actually a little annoyed by the fact that most of the images you see are 'color enhanced' or 'artificially colored'. You actually have to hunt for images that show what it would really look like to be standing there on Mars. The NASA page describes it better:

Quote:

colors have been modified as if the scene were transported to Earth and illuminated by terrestrial sunlight.

Nice summary of the telecon - even included that interminable avionics information!

*laugh* Well, I enjoyed it, anyway. I wasn't able to make it exciting enough for you?

maschnitz wrote:

A minor correction for you: the two primary "computing elements" have 2GB storage each, but the cameras have their own storage, too. MastCam's cameras, for example, has "eight GB of flash memory [each], which is capable of storing over 5,500 raw images". MAHLI does too.

Wow, everything looks so similar to Earth. It's amazing to think that so many millions of miles away, you have the same elements, molecules, physics that make everything look so similar.

For what it's worth, I do hope they find life!

I'm actually a little annoyed by the fact that most of the images you see are 'color enhanced' or 'artificially colored'. You actually have to hunt for images that show what it would really look like to be standing there on Mars. The NASA page describes it better:

Quote:

colors have been modified as if the scene were transported to Earth and illuminated by terrestrial sunlight.

They uploaded the OS after the probe was in transit? So they didn't get the OS done until after launching it? How fast can they upload? And why a different OS for ground operation, they had to use the rover's CPU for flight? Too expensive to use a different CPU for flight and avoid the risk of reprogramming an FPGA on a different planet?

Have there been any articles on the com systems? I haven't been able to be online much unfortunately and a summary of various means of communication and speeds would be appreciated. I know it relays through orbiting satellites but it also has some direct capability.

Have there been any articles on the com systems? I haven't been able to be online much unfortunately and a summary of various means of communication and speeds would be appreciated. I know it relays through orbiting satellites but it also has some direct capability.

Not a lot of information but some. There is also a tab a the top that say's X-band radio waves and under that there is more information.Looking at it further there is also a tab labled Data Rates which will give you the speed information.

Wow, everything looks so similar to Earth. It's amazing to think that so many millions of miles away, you have the same elements, molecules, physics that make everything look so similar.

For what it's worth, I do hope they find life!

I'm actually a little annoyed by the fact that most of the images you see are 'color enhanced' or 'artificially colored'. You actually have to hunt for images that show what it would really look like to be standing there on Mars. The NASA page describes it better:

Quote:

colors have been modified as if the scene were transported to Earth and illuminated by terrestrial sunlight.

I wonder what the ratio of scientists to publicists is at NASA?

This mission is also responsible for funding future missions.

I probably should have mentioned that in the article. It was a major topic at the press conference.

Both versions of all the photos are available, as is all the raw data. The problem is that there's so much dust in Mars' atmosphere, everything appears red. It's the JPL team themselves who work mostly with the corrected photos, because an image that has color in it is a lot more meaningful than an image in which everything is a shade of one color.

They uploaded the OS after the probe was in transit? So they didn't get the OS done until after launching it? How fast can they upload? And why a different OS for ground operation, they had to use the rover's CPU for flight? Too expensive to use a different CPU for flight and avoid the risk of reprogramming an FPGA on a different planet?

Yes.They're improving the software all the time, expect them to update the OS again during the mission, just as with the MER rovers. Fast enough, the rover has plenty of time to sit and download software and commands. Weight considerations; it's more efficient in terms of maximizing the mass you can put on the surface if you make the flight hardware dumb and put all the flight control software in the rover.

how many seeds did we bring? how many water bottles? when we add our seeds to their dirt, will our seeds grow? when we water their ground, will something hidden grow?

aren't we all about finding out about life by jumping in?

Is that a joke? Sorry if my sense of humour isn't working.

I'm pretty sure 'dirt' on Earth is the end product of billions of years of organic activity and full of useful-to-Earth-plants nutrients, whereas 'dirt' on Mars is going to be more like inert sand.

Same goes for the air, which is full of nitrogen, oxygen, CO2, insects and of course water on Earth - I think lots of plants get lots of their water from the air.

Don't forget that animal life existed for millions of years in the seas before there was anything on the land, including plants. For a long time it was just moss and ferns, which reproduce using sperm, then big trees, and flowering plants only came along about 65 million years ago at the end of the dinosaur era, followed even more recently by grass.

It took a lot of organic activity to change the seas, land and atmosphere to the environment where our current plants evolved to live.

Much as I loathe picking nits and love being addicted to MSL:C (Mars Science Laboratory:Curiousity), I really have to take issue with the word "sol" used to define a Martian day. "Sol" is difficult to pronounce, does not allow the Martian "night" as a derivative ("unsol"?) and worse, serves no purpose other than as an idiomatic decoration.So what if a day on Mars is longer than twenty-four hours? It's still a day and needs no special word designating it's existence.

Much as I loathe picking nits and love being addicted to MSL:C (Mars Science Laboratory:Curiousity), I really have to take issue with the word "sol" used to define a Martian day. "Sol" is difficult to pronounce, does not allow the Martian "night" as a derivative ("unsol"?) and worse, serves no purpose other than as an idiomatic decoration.So what if a day on Mars is longer than twenty-four hours? It's still a day and needs no special word designating it's existence.

They use sol so there's no confusion between talking about Earth days or Martian days, since the controllers operate on Mars time (even wearing special watches that run on Mars time). They talk sols when discussing what they will do with the rover on Mars, and days when they discuss what they will do with the family tomorrow.

To all the people ranting about the color correction on the mars photos: the color corrected version is probably closer to what we would see on mars, since our eyes/brains automatically color correct (as opposed to raw data from photographic chips). As posted previously nasa offers both sets - often side by side. What the surface of mars really looks like to the naked eye no one will know until we get there.

While I understand the need for white balancing the images for study, I find myself much more drawn by the unprocessed versions - so alien and yet still somewhat familiar. To think that there are near innumerable other planets in the infinitude of space... what wonders exist out there that we can't even imagine! Everyone on the magic school bus, lets go!!

Wow, everything looks so similar to Earth. It's amazing to think that so many millions of miles away, you have the same elements, molecules, physics that make everything look so similar.

For what it's worth, I do hope they find life!

I'm actually a little annoyed by the fact that most of the images you see are 'color enhanced' or 'artificially colored'. You actually have to hunt for images that show what it would really look like to be standing there on Mars. The NASA page describes it better:

Quote:

colors have been modified as if the scene were transported to Earth and illuminated by terrestrial sunlight.

I wonder what the ratio of scientists to publicists is at NASA?

This mission is also responsible for funding future missions.

I probably should have mentioned that in the article. It was a major topic at the press conference.

Both versions of all the photos are available, as is all the raw data. The problem is that there's so much dust in Mars' atmosphere, everything appears red. It's the JPL team themselves who work mostly with the corrected photos, because an image that has color in it is a lot more meaningful than an image in which everything is a shade of one color.

From what I understand from the NASA website, the modified colors are explicitly for the benefit of terrestrial geologists who are used to identifying rocks using our Earthbound lighting.

Probably the same thing FPGAs are used for in normal hardware: miscellaneous custom logic that can't be provided by stock components (CPU, RAM, flash, etc.) and is too low-volume to justify an ASIC.

Well, yeah, I guessed that. I'm just wondering what specific functions they're using them for. Maybe the software radios?

FPGAs are good at doing specific complex tasks (like a radio perhaps, or a special compression algorithm) and/or lots of small really simple functions. If you want X to happen every time Y happens in an FPGA it takes a couple gates, in software it takes an interrupt routine with all the complexity and timing uncertainty involved with that.

That said, I'd assume they also want to be able to re-configure because otherwise the cost of an asic would seem worth it for the power savings and reduced chance of configuration errors.

I probably should have mentioned that in the article. It was a major topic at the press conference.

Both versions of all the photos are available, as is all the raw data. The problem is that there's so much dust in Mars' atmosphere, everything appears red. It's the JPL team themselves who work mostly with the corrected photos, because an image that has color in it is a lot more meaningful than an image in which everything is a shade of one color.

Thanks for this info. It helps to understand that they have a good reason for doing it. Originally I had heard that Curiosity was designed to give us an impression of what Mars would look like with our own eyes (or something pretty close at least). If I didn't read your comment here, I would have been really irritated and misinformed, thinking that they were once again dressing up the pictures for some stupid reason.

Great article too, thanks again, keep it up! Hopefully I'll have a chance to check out the recolored images next to the real color images soon. Are they not showing the untouched pics as much because they're extra dusty or something? Still not sure why they don't release those to most of us. I understand the geology part, but the general public doesn't care if you can identify the rocks, they want to see what it really looks like out there (imo).